Kyoto Drivers

Friendly Kyoto - well, it was until the taxi driver refused to open the door to let us in. That hasn't happened me in a long time, and you'd think that Kyoto would be used to taxis by now. Sarah went up to the window and knocked, saying 'nihongo ga dekiru yo' (we can speak Japanese). At this magical signal, he opened the door, but I wasn't having any of it. I leaned my head in the door and told him that I wasn't going to get in his taxi and that he had lowered the whole image of Kyoto.

We got another taxi immediately. Kyoto is full of taxis and this guy was happy to take our money and bring us to the Irish pub in Gion to see some jazz. He was a 'yes' man - he kept saying say to everything.
Are you from Kyoto?
Yes.
Do you like Kyoto?
Yes.
Where should we go to see in Kyoto?
Yes.
Have you ever been to Afghanistan?
Yes.

We had a drink at Tadg's in Gion and watched the jazz band who were rather fun. The piano player looked a little uncomfortable but that may have been because it was a small stage and he was six foot five with the most impressive nose we had ever seen.

On the way back, our renewed image of friendly Kyoto was slightly damaged. About 200 meters from Gion, as we walked down a tiny road that surely used to be for rickshaw only, we came to one of the most dangerous junctions that I have ever seen. Where these two tiny roads of less than five meters met, taxis were jostling for position in each direction. I almost lost my foot as a taxi swerved by me, narrowly also missing a taxi coming in the other direction. So much stress trapped inside these drivers, coming out in the form of anxious life-threatening dashes back to the line of taxis waiting in Gion.

When we finally got one of the madmen to stop, he had already morphed into the placid Kyoto taxi driver that we expect. He was an old man, pretty hard of hearing, from Kyoto of course. Almost all taxi drivers in Kyoto are from Kyoto, unlike Nagoya where they seem to mainly come from Kyushu.

The madness had been covered over again.